


sonicmetennant Halloween Fic-a-Thon

by scatterthewords



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-23
Updated: 2016-07-23
Packaged: 2018-07-26 05:24:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 8,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7562098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scatterthewords/pseuds/scatterthewords
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>TenToo and Rose enjoy some Halloweeny, spoopy adventures together.</p><p>I was going to write 31 days of Halloween fic prompts for TenToo/Rose. I only made it to 21, but still, a pretty decent chunk of fic! Each section is varying in length and content, but they're all Halloween-related.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. black cat

“Doctor?” She dropped her keys on the small table just inside the door, looking around her cautiously. “Now what’s he got to…” she muttered to herself.

Rose had left work early after an urgent and somewhat garbled message from the Doctor. That was nothing new, really, but she’d learned after he’d nearly burned their flat down not to leave him on his own for too long when he left messages like that.

“Doctor?” she called out again, stepping further down the hall.

She froze just outside the living room door.  
The whole room was a mass of wriggling, squirming, mewling black fur. The Doctor was mostly buried in the middle of it, laughing and squirming and scooping some of the fur up and putting it down elsewhere. He stopped when he spotted her, sitting up slowly enough to slide the cats down his torso so as not to hurt them.

“Rose, look!”

She hadn’t moved from where she’d stopped, wide eyes roving around every cat-covered surface in the flat. “What did you do?"she asked in barely a whisper.

The smile faltered on his face, but he forced it back up. "Black cats are good luck, Rose! I was reading about it online today. They bring travelers back safe, keep you out of harms way, and with the sort of life the both of us always seem to live, well, I thought we could use extra help! So I popped on down to the shelter, and there were all these cats, no one really adopts them. Something about them not being colorful enough. Which is nonsense, really! There’s a whole spectrum of color in their coats, you just have to look for it! Far better than ginger cats if I do say so myself. And, look, Rose, just look!” He scrambled to his feet, keeping one tiny black kitten cupped in his hands. He shuffled across the floor, careful not to step on any of the creatures pouncing around his feet.

He held the kitten out to her as he approached. “Just look how adorable she is! Look at the eyes, and the little paws! I’m telling you, this level of cute, this little girl here would be worshiped as an offspring of the god of–Rose, why are you backing away? What’s wrong? Why are you sneezing? Rose?”

Her back hit the wall even as she continued trying to wave him off, covering her nose and mouth with the corner of her coat even as she wheezed into it. “Doctor, why did you bring all these cats into our flat? I’m allergic!”

He lowered the cat, looking at her in stunned confusion. “You never said… But I… You… You pet the cat! You pet that cat in London, 2012!”

“One cat, Doctor! One! I’m not terribly allergic but what do you think will happen when you get this many cats into one…” She cut off as another itching cough racked through her throat.

His look of confusion faded to one of concern. His childlike demeanor also dropped away, replaced with one of professionalism. He set the cat back inside the room, closing the door to keep them quarantined. “Oh, Rose, I am so, so sorry.” He moved to hug her, glanced at his hands, and thought better of it. “Get a bag together. Go…” She watched him take a hard swallow. “Go spend the night at your mum’s. I’ll find loving homes for all the cats, and get this place cleaned thoroughly.”

Risking more of a reaction, she grabbed him by the front of his suit, pulling him against her. His eyes darkened as they darted down to her lips and back to her eyes. “Then you’ll make it up to me, right?”

A grin split his face and he ducked his head closer to hers. “Oh yes. I don’t plan on letting those newly-cleaned surfaces stay clean for long.”

Before he could reach her lips, she ducked around him, heading for the room and suppressing another cough. “Get the cats out of here, Doctor!”


	2. skeleton

“But that’s not right! Not even close!”

She sighed, adjusting the hood on Tony’s costume once more. “Doctor, it’s just a costume.”

“’m a skeleton! Boo!” She grinned at Tony holding his arms up towards the Doctor, wiggling his little black and white fingers at him.

But the Doctor knelt down, sliding on his glasses. “There are far more ribs in a human skeleton than three on each side. That is not an accurate depiction of the femur whatsoever, not even close! And–”

She cut him off by picking Tony up into her arms, tapping him on the nose. “It’s a child’s costume, Doctor. I doubt Tony’s playmates will care if he’s anatomically correct.”

He rose to his feet behind her, a pout forming on his lips.

“Besides, I made it myself despite Mum’s pleas to use one of her professional designers. Tony’s happy with it, aren’t you, Tony?” She giggled with him, nuzzling into her little brother’s neck and smiling at his shrieks of joy. “I’d say that’s good enough.”

She set him back down on the floor, giving him a slight nudge to head up the stairs and show off his costume for his class party to Jackie and Pete. Before Rose could follow, the Doctor caught her from behind, holding her tightly against him and murmuring in her ear, “Well, Rose Tyler, do I need to give you another lesson in anatomy tonight?”

His long fingers traced her hipbones along her jeans. She shivered into his touch, and arched back against him. “Well it’s the only way I’ll ever learn.”


	3. full moon

She stumbled to a stop at the top of the hill, gaping up at the sky in wonder. “It’s beautiful! I’ve never seen the moon so big!”

He came running up behind her, giving her a light shove to start her momentum down the hill. “C'mon, Rose, we’re going to lose it!”

She laughed, slipping her hand into his and running alongside him as they always seemed to do. “So there was still a werewolf in this universe that started Torchwood.”

He looked back at her with a grin. “Looks like it, doesn’t it?”

“So, what, now that the monarchy did not last in this universe, Queen Victoria’s descendants decided to run wild on the moors of the UK? Are you sure we’re not in one of those cheesy monster films you seem so found of?”

“Hush, you!” he crowed back at her, towing her along through the swamp and the mists. A howl sounded to their right, and he changed directions, dashing off faster than she could follow.

“Doctor!” she panted, pressing a hand to her side. “Slow down!” She watched him slowly disappear into the night and the mist. “I’m getting too old for this,” she grumbled.

Slowing down to get her bearings, knowing that she was the one that would have to get them out of this if they got lost this time, she picked carefully through the thickening marsh, taking stock of what options they had. The original Torchwood estate, if it even still stood, was miles away; they’d never reach it by tonight. So she had to come up with another way to amplify the moonlight to stop the creature.

Her phone was to her ear in seconds. Usually she’d have no hope for a signal out here, but as soon as the Doctor had made a replacement sonic, he’d boosted her signal–something about a missed opportunity for perfectly good phone sex while she was on assignment in Romania.

“Right. Thanks, Scott. If the Doctor’s good at anything, it’s being a diversion. Yeah, we’ll see you there in about thirty minutes.” She clicked her phone shut, continuing her pace through the gathering fog. The Doctor’s foot prints had long since faded from the spongy ground, and knowing how often he change directions, she slowed to a stop.

Cupping her hands around her mouth, she yelled, “DOCTOR!”

She paused, waiting to hear a response. Just when she was about to raise her hands to call out once more, a definitely Doctor-sounding yelp rang out from her right, followed by a horrible, deep growl. Her stomach flipped over, her heart rising up into her throat. “Doctor!” She turned and tore through the darkness as quickly as she could, hoping against hope that he wasn’t as bad off as his cry had sounded.


	4. werewolf

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A continuation of yesterday's "full moon" prompt.

“DOCTOR!” she yelled, barreling through the darkness, towards where she had heard him last.

The fog faded around a large hulking form. The Doctor’s sonic lit up his form, pinstripes pinned to the ground, arm struggling to keep the snapping werewolf from biting off his face.

She searched the ground for something, anything that could help, but came up empty. Thinking fast, she pulled her mobile back out of her pocket, reeled her arm back, and hurled it at the creature’s head.  
It rolled off of him, whipping it’s head around to fix beady black eyes on her. Her heart pounded, remembering a similar look in an old estate in Scotland centuries ago.

It charged towards her, but familiar arms wrapped around her waist, dragging her away. “Run!” the Doctor whispered in her ear, sliding his hand to hers and dragging her along.

The werewolf howled, fading into the mists behind them. “HA!” he crowed, hurrying them on faster. He turned a dazzling smile on her. “Rose Tyler, you’re brilliant you are!”

“You can say that again later.” She tugged his hand, forcing him to change directions. “Come on. Scott and I have a plan.”

He shot one last look over their shoulders. “Guess this means I’m going to have to fix you up another mobile then?”

She opened her mouth to respond, but was cut off by another deep, rumbling growl as the creature started chasing after them.


	5. autumn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guest appearances by friends because of birthdays!

“Are you sure you got the coordinates right?” she asked, reaching down to the hem of her jumper to pull it up over her head.

The Doctor poked his head out the doors, a frown creasing his face. “But… Aw… No, I’m sure I got it right! October, America… You wanted to see an American Halloween!”

“Yeah, I did.” Rose tossed her sweater at his head. “Chilly nights, colourful leaves, all that comes with it. But it’s hot, here, Doctor.”

“Maybe… the New Girl got it a bit wrong…” he murmured to himself ducking inside again. She shook her head at him; he’d never admit he was still an awful pilot.  
Rose looked around. In one window, some cobwebs hung. On a porch, a pumpkin grinned at her. “Okay… maybe he got it right…” She stepped closer to examine some of the decorations. “But this isn’t what was always on those old movies. Maybe he accidentally took us to another planet?”

She looked around her again, and caught a woman peeking around a corner, staring wide-eyed at her. Was the New Girl’s perception filters not working yet? Had she seen them land?

“Er… Hello there!” Rose called out, smiling nervously and taking a tentative step forward.

The woman came the rest of the way out of hiding, still staring at her wide-eyed.

“That is a fantastic costume!” the woman gushed, finally breaking her spell of silence. “You look just like Billie Piper! Though I don’t remember that outfit from the show.”

Rose’s brow creased in confusion, looking down at herself. “Who..?” She shook her head, deciding not to worry about it. “I know this may seem like a really strange question, but, um… could you tell me when and where we are?”

The woman’s eyes went wide again, and she spun on her heel, looking around them frantically. Her eyes struggled to adjust, but eventually fell on the blue police box and the pinstriped man stepping out of it. “Doctor?!” she gasped, hand flying to her mouth.

The Doctor froze at being addressed in a new voice. He looked sheepishly between the woman and an equally flabbergasted Rose. “Hello. Have we… met?”

The woman clamped her mouth shut, shaking her head and taking a step forward. “Um… wow… Hi! I’m…. I’m Nili. It’s a pleasure to meet you both.”

Rose looked her up and down appraisingly. They’d received stranger welcomes. At least this woman seemed to be nice and not a threat. “Pleasure to meet you, Nili.”

“Nili, fascinating name. That’s not… Not American,” the Doctor trailed off, frowning back at the TARDIS. “Maybe I did get it wrong.”

“No! Oh, your question!” Nili shook herself to try to gather her thoughts. “You’re in California, Bay Area to be specific. It’s Halloween night, 2012. I was just on my way to a party, which would explain the…” She gestured vaguely to her colorful outfit.

“See, Rose, just like I promised!” He rocked back on his heels, grinning proudly.

She walked over to his side, poking him in the ribs. “California, though. That explains the heat, and lack of colorful leaves.”

“I could… take you back east somewhere, if you like?”

“Then we might end up in the entirely wrong time!” she teased.

“Um…” A soft voice interrupted them. They both looked up to find the woman still looking between them hopefully. “You could… come to the party with me, if you want, I mean.”

Rose took in the hopeful look in Nili’s eyes, turning back to the Doctor. “I’ll go get my costume on!” she called, darting under his arm and back into the bowels of the TARDIS.


	6. witch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One more friend guest appearance, because I couldn't help it. :3

“Wait, you mean you’ve actually dealt with a witch before?” she whispered, creeping along behind him.

“Yep.” He popped the “p”, only to be shushed by Rose. “Back when Martha and I took a visit to Shakespeare. Well, when I say witch, I really mean a Carrionite, but they work in much the same way! Probably inspiration for many of your witch tales.”

“Doctor,” she warned. His voice had been growing incrementally louder through his ramble until he was talking at a normal level again. Their target had stopped her walk, looking around her in confusion. They stood completely still, holding their breaths. She shook her head, continuing on down the path.

As they continued to trail her, Rose whispered to him again, “Why is it bad that one’s here?”  
“Well… Carrionites are old. Older than most of the universe. But the Time War trapped them all. They control everything around them with the power of words, and that’s not very fair is it? I thought we had trapped them all in a globe back in my old TARDIS, but maybe this one managed to survive by escaping to this universe.”

“What do we have to do to get rid of her?”

“Name it.”

She stopped, and he moved several more crouching steps before he realized her warmth was not at his back, and turned to look at her with raised eyebrows. “Really? Naming it? That’s it? No… transdimensional portal to hurl them into? No summoning of the Shadow Proclamation? No burning at the stake?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Rose,” he scoffed, making a shooing motion with his hands. “I told you, the power of words. Now come on, we’re going to lose her.”

He picked up his pace through the darkness, keeping on the heels of the witch walking along in front of him until they were clear of where other people could see. Nodding to Rose, he swung around in front. “Now!” he called, jumping out in the path of the witch.

Rose lept forward, grabbing the witch’s arms to stop her from disappearing like the Doctor warned her they would. “HEY!” the witch yelled, struggling to get free of her hold.

The Doctor gathered himself up, gaining attention of the witch. She stopped struggling, just stared at him with an angry expression on her face. “I name thee, Carrionite.” He pointed his finger at her with a flourish.

Nothing happened.

The witch shrugged off Rose’s hold, glaring at the Doctor. “Look, I don’t care how good your costume is. You can’t go jumping out and pulling shit like this on people. Who set you up? Was it someone from the lab? Because I’d be surprised they thought of something like this, in the middle of all that homework. No wonder none of us are getting anything done.”

Rose looked confusedly between the woman and the Doctor. “Why didn’t it work? Doctor?”

“You can stop the act, now,” the girl replied, folding her arms over her chest.

Unsure of how to respond, the Doctor looked between Rose and the not-witch. “Are you sure you’re not a Carrionite?”

The woman scoffed, shaking her head. “Of course not! I’m an architecture major.”

“But.. But… But…” the Doctor fumbled. “That doesn’t prove anything! The carrionites used an architect to build a building to amplify their powers! Maybe this one’s just cutting out the middle man.” He pulled his sonic out, aiming it at her and scanning her up and down. Rose groaned, burying her burning face in her hands.

“Give me that,” the woman snapped, pulling the screwdriver away. “You’re taking this game a little…” She trailed to a stop, looking down at the tool in her hand. “Wait a minute, this isn’t a model I recognize…”

She looked back up, looking closer at the Doctor and Rose and the clothing they were wearing. “No… No way…”

The Doctor took a step back, opening his mouth to start preventing anything that might happen.

The woman made a strange, garbled noise in the back of her throat, clamping her free hand over her mouth. Slowly she lowered it, looking at them with wide eyes. “Are you really the Doctor and Rose?”

They looked at each other confused. “Doctor, this is the second person who’s recognized us. Are you sure we didn’t meet them in the future?”

The Doctor shrugged, running a hand through his hair. “I never claimed to understand how this universe works, Rose!”

“No, you don’t understand, I–!” The woman cut herself off, looking back to make sure there was no one around. “I’m Kyle, and I’m a really big fan. Oh please, please, can you take me on a trip? Just one? Maybe somewhere colder than here?”

They took in her hopeful face and looked at each other. Rose shrugged. “Well, we do sort of owe her… for the jumping out of the dark and scaring her thing.”

The Doctor grinned, nodding his head and bouncing on his heels. “Rose Tyler, you’ve just picked up your first companion!”

“Second!” Rose teased, jabbing him in the ribs.

“Come on, then,” he turned back to Kyle, a grin on his face. “Allons-y!”


	7. zombie

“Doctor, look out!” Rose grabbed him by the collar, yanking him back. The zombie took a snap at his just-disappeared hand, but he didn’t seem frightened at all. He just seemed excited.

“Look at the dexterity on these creatures, Rose! Really, with this level of decay, you would think they’d be much stiffer. They’re a marvel and a beauty, really they are!”

“Admire later, run now!” She tugged on his hand, keeping her eyes on the two zombies limp-running towards them. She had to get him out past the containment field, out to more Torchwood reinforcements. She wouldn’t lose him like she’d lost Shawn, or the medical staff of this former facility. “Doctor, move!” She gave him a shove, stumbling after him.


	8. pile of leaves

Her fingers tightened around his as a shiver ran through her. It was so quiet in this orchard they’d found far off the main road. The trees blocked out all noise except the occasional whisper of a falling leaf. But it was cold under the nearly bare branches, and she huddled deeper into her coat.

Seeing her plight, the Doctor wrapped his arm around her shoulder, pulling his coat out to add it to her layers. But with how skinny he was, the movement made her smash into his side, turning sideways even as she tried to continue walking forward.

Rose halted, her laugh muffled by his shoulder. “I don’t think this is working.”  
He pulled her around to face him, standing toe-to-toe and chest-to-chest, wrapping his coat around her fully. The wind tousled his already messy hair as he grinned down at her. “You’re probably right. Want to head back to the car?”

She wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing one chilled cheek against his chest over his one heart. “No, I like it here. Not often we get a quiet moment to ourselves, yeah?”

He craned his head around, looking up through the emptying branches above them. “Torchwood should be calling any second. Lucky that Ephermiral slimed your mobile past the point of functioning.”

She lifted her head to grin at him, tongue poking between her teeth. “Lucky, yeah. I’d say you just about threw it at him.”

The Doctor shrugged, returning his eyes to her. “The electrical current your modified mobile emits was the perfect thing to repel it. I couldn’t very well let it slime you, now could I? Terrible boyfriend behavior, that.”

He frowned at the word, and by the way his jaw twitched, she could tell he was rolling the word around in his mouth. “After the paparazzi debacle you don’t like me using lover. Husband’s not it, either. Oh so much more than companions. Hmmm…”

She laughed, cutting him off. “Not very Doctor-y behavior, letting anyone get slimed, least of all me.”

He beamed down at her. “Right! Terrible Doctor behavior. Can’t let my Rose get that foul-smelling goop on her lovely new jumper.” He arched back to look down her shirt, making her laugh again.

Putting a label on their relationship had been difficult to say the least. So they’d stopped trying. Seems all they could agree on was possession. His Rose. Her Doctor. Forever.

She was interrupted from her thoughts by another cold blast of wind, making her shiver and arch into him. His eyes darkened for a split second before he lowered his head, hiding his eyes from her as his lips ghosted over her ear. “If you’re not willing to head back just yet, we could find other ways of warming you up.”

He backed her up until she bumped into the trunk of a tree. His hard body pinning her left no doubt as to what he had in mind. But a mischievous glint sparked in her eyes just as she ground against him. He groaned, burying his face in her neck. When she was sure she had him off focus, she pushed against the tree, sending them forward.

He stumbled back, tumbling down into a pile of leaves at their feet. Arms flailed and clutched wildly, pulling her down with him. She planted her knees on either side of his hips, grinning as she rose against him. “Oooh,” he breathed with excitement–and a little breathlessly; whether from her or the impact with the ground, she wasn’t sure.


	9. candy corn

He made another face, sticking his tongue out, causing her to roll her eyes at him. “Doctor, if you don’t like them, then stop eating them.”

He snatched the bag closer to his chest, half turning to hide them as if afraid she would take them away. “Not until I’ve analyzed all the ingredients!”

She shook her head, motioning vaguely towards the package. “You could just read the list on the back.”

He scoffed, settling back onto the couch and popping another of the little orange, yellow, and white candies into his mouth. “Come now, Rose, after all we’ve seen, after all we’ve done, you really trust the packaging to tell you the truth?”  
She tossed a pillow at his head. “You trusted that packaging on the powdered doughnuts that claimed they were within your diet limits.”

Candy corn temporarily forgotten, he pouted at her. “Still half-Time Lord, Rose. I told you, I don’t need a diet.”

She arched an eyebrow at him and poked at his slightly grown belly. It wasn’t that he had put on an excessive amount of weight, or even that she minded (it definitely made her feel better; wasn’t the only one any more to have to watch the chips), but he didn’t seem to be burning it off as quickly as he once had. “Well your half-human side thinks so.”

He continued to pout at her, so she stole a handful of the candies from the bag in his lap. Popping one in her mouth, she chewed thoughtfully before turning back to him. “I don’t know why you keep making faces anyways. I like them.”

His nose wrinkled. He lifted the bag to peer suspiciously at its contents. “They’re too… waxy for candy.”

Rose slowed her chewing, pushing the candy thoughtfully around her mouth. “Well I like them. Reminds me of growing up back at the estate with Mum. Candy corn’s cheaper than chocolate, so we always got some around Halloween.”

He cocked his head, thinking about her answer. “Sensory memory? The human tendency to attach memories to all their perceptions and thus alter future encounters… It’s been proven before.” He shrugged, popping another one into his mouth. Swallowing, he gave a full-body shudder and stuck his tongue out again.

Openly shaking her head at him, she snatched the bag away. “Mine!” she declared, settling down into the opposite corner of the couch.


	10. mask

“Are you my mummy?”

His heart dropped down into his stomach as he stared at the rubber gas mask in his hand.

The skies filled with gas, people running and screaming for help. Any way out of the hell that was filling the whole world. Images flashed through his mind of smoke and fire and so much death, everyone he knew burning, burning, burning.

Memory and reality blurred together and he was falling, falling, losing himself in the mayhem and madness, death and destruction. He grasped for an anchor, anything to hold him to reality.

He came up empty.

His hands trembled around the mask. Just let it go. Just drop it. Just walk away. He willed himself to move, to do something. But nothing happened.  
“Latest firing stock. What do you think, Doctor?”

“Are you my mummy?”

Rose would think it was funny. Rose would know what he was talking about, rather than giving him the blank stare through wide glass eyes of the gas mask. Rose would…

No, he couldn’t start down that rabbit hole, not now. He had too much to do. Too many lives at stake. He needed Donna to anchor him, drag him back to the present. Wonderful, strong, brilliant Donna. She could…

But she wasn’t here.

Martha! Martha could…

Something was wrong with Martha. Martha wasn’t Martha.

He was alone.

He heard rapid breathing, realizing belatedly it was him. Was he hyperventilating? Stupid human body and its lack of a respiratory bypass. But of course he couldn’t breathe; he was drowning, drowning, drowning in the endless memories of the past, of war and pain and death and destruction. Drowning with no hope for salvation.

“Doctor, look at these!”

His eyes snapped up to Rose, across the store. His beautiful, wonderful, perfect Rose who… was currently hiding her face behind an ugly pig mask that reminded him of dark New York sewers and laboratories that were all wrong.

She lowered the mask, revealing wide, concerned eyes. Oh, he must look a sight. She dropped the rubber mask and hurried to him, removing the horrid gas mask from his grasp and wrapping her arms around him, finally the anchor he’d been desperately searching for. “It’s okay, it’s okay. Whatever it is, I’ve got you.”

His hands clutched at her back, his head nodding frantically against her shoulder as he sucked in shuddering gasps of air, willing himself to just breathe. He wasn’t in that hell anymore. Somehow he was here, with her, his anchor and his salvation. That hell was only reserved for him, now; and for the first time in a long time, he felt utterly guilty for being the one who got the better end of the deal.


	11. ghost

Haunted. He had been haunted by her for years. So many late nights, when Martha or Donna had gone to bed, or even the times when he’d had nobody at all aboard the TARDIS. Just him, and the ghost of her trailing him everywhere.

He should have been used to ghosts. Pain and death seemed to follow him everywhere he went, and so did the lives that had been lost because of his actions.

But this ghost was different. She came to him in the middle of all the others, when things were the worst, reminding him of better times, trying to heal a heart that didn’t deserve to be healed.

Then she’d come back, and he had been left here with her. He supposed, back in the old TARDIS and the same old life, the other him was still haunted by her. But as he focused on her face, on the feeling of her moving over and around him, he cupped her cheek and smiled gently at her. Her rhythm faltered as she bent down to kiss him.

“I will always be haunted by you,” he murmured against her lips. “And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”


	12. pumpkin

He frowned down at the spaghetti squash in his hand. “This is daft.”

She looked over his shoulder. “Nah, you just need to make the eye a bit bigger, but that’s why we’re drawing them on with markers before we cut, yeah?”

He dropped it, watching as it bounced off the ground and rolled away from him. “We’re supposed to carve pumpkins.”

She shrugged, then turned back to her own squash, sticking her tongue out as she drew another line. “Well, in this universe, they stuck with turnips and small squashes. No one ever made the leap to pumpkins.”

He seemed uninterested in her explanation as he got up and walked away. “Doctor!” she called after him in shock. “Where are you going?”  
He didn’t answer her, just disappeared around the corner of the house. She looked between the way he’d gone and her own squash. Just before she decided to go after him, she heard grunts coming from the way he’d gone. She raised her head again to see him limping around the corner of the house, a huge pumpkin in his arms.

“Where did you even get that?!” she cried, jumping to her feet and running over to him.

“Back porch,” he grunted with a grin which slipped away into concentration as soon as it came.

“What are you–”

Before she could finish her question, his fingers slipped. A look of panic washed over his face as he grabbed at it with frantic hands.

But the gourd slipped right through his hold, hitting the ground with a sickening squish. She looked down with him at the tangle of orange guts on the walk below them.

“Mum’s gonna kill you.”

He started, then tugged on his ear. “Maybe she won’t–we could kip off to the store, get her another one? She doesn’t even have to notice!”

Rose started laughing, shaking her head at him. “That was a one-of-a-kind award-winning pumpkin Mum bought from the fair. She was going to have the cook make a pumpkin stew out of it for the party tonight. You’re dead. You are soooo dead,” she teased, tongue poking between her teeth.

The colour drained out of his face before he dropped to his knees, picking at the ruined vegetable. “Well, you can still make soup out of this! I mean, Rose! Rose, stop laughing! You can’t let her… Rose, please!”


	13. caramel apple

“Rose, I have had caramel plenty of times, in all different times, on a host of planets. I like chocolate better.” He waggled his eyebrows at her, clearly trying to distract her with thoughts of their messy sheets back at the flat.

She shook her head at him, holding the treat out. “Yeah, but you haven’t tried caramel here. I’m telling you, whatever they do in this universe, it tastes better than the stuff you’re used to!” He continued to eye the apple. “Besides, you haven’t tasted it with those taste buds yet,” she challenged. “Maybe their less skilled now. Maybe you can’t tell me the exact composition of the caramel.”

He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her flush against him, bending his head to lick up the column of her neck. Her breath caught in her throat, and she felt him smirk against her skin. When he got to her ear, he stopped to murmur, “You thought my tongue was pretty skilled before.”

He pulled back to grin lopsidedly at her, hooded eyes taking in her flushed face. He bent to kiss her, but before he could press his lips to hers, she pulled the apple between them.

He stopped with his lips against the caramel, eyes popping open. He opened his mouth to protest, tongue getting caught on the sticky surface.

His eyes widened more, and he pressed forward, taking a large bite.

He let go of her, tugging the caramel apple away from her and spinning away to munch on it happily. “Using ox milk instead of cow, that’s brilliant!”


	14. haunted house

“No.”

“But Rooooooose.”

“No chance.”

He pouted at her with those big, puppy dog eyes, but she wouldn’t be swayed. “You have seen Gelth. Slitheen. A real live werewolf! Plus whatever you saw before you started traveling with me. Why in the world would you want to go to some stupid, cheesy, fake haunted house with a bunch of blokes in silly costumes who jump out and try–and will fail–to scare us?”

He didn’t answer her, merely pouted at her harder.  
“Wait just a moment. Is this because Jake was telling you he enjoys watching horror movies only because it makes Michael cling to him?”

He threw his hands up. “Ju-on and Ringu did absolutely NOTHING for you! And I was assured those were the scariest movies out there for humans.”

“Not with you analyzing the logistics of a likely alien child wreaking havoc through such primitive means as a video tape.” She moved back towards the living room, intent on finishing the laundry the Doctor had called her away from.

But when she stepped into the hall, he moved up behind her, spinning her around and pressing her into the wall. “But Rose, think of all the dark spaces. All the abandoned little corners. We could give the papers another scandal for your mother to fret over.” His grin got slightly less sultry as it brightened.

Grabbing fistfuls of the loose tee he wore, she raised one leg to hook it around his hip and pull him into her. She grinned as his fell away when she ground into him. “Or we could make our very own haunted house here. I’m sure we could manage something that would make me shriek.”


	15. seance

Her feet hurt. Her head hurt. Every tip of each finger hurt. Hell, even her teeth hurt. The Urions were finally off the planet; if she had her way, she would go home, climb in a warm bath, then not move from her bed for a week, just snuggled up to the Doctor’s side, occasionally sending him for nibbles.

She should have known that wasn’t in his plans.

She opened the door to the flat, startled to find it completely dark. Testing the switch did nothing. She sighed, dropped her keys on the table near the door, and trudged inside.

She came to a stop in the doorway to the living room. One single candle on the side table illuminated her view.

The Doctor sat at a circular table, feet tucked under him and her old scarf wrapped around his head. He stared at the crystal ball propped in the center of the table with an intense look of concentration that was interrupted when he looked up to see her.

“Rose!” he beamed. “You’re just in time for the seance!”

“Nope,” she responded, turning away from him and trudging dutifully into the bathroom.


	16. vampire

“Rose?” The Doctor dropped the bag he’d been carrying just inside the door, flipping the switch ineffectively. “Huh. I’m sure I reengaged the lighting system…” he muttered to himself. “Rose?”

Stepping carefully so he didn’t trip over his purchases, the Doctor meandered farther into the flat. He’d have to check the fuses in the kitchen. Maybe Rose hadn’t gotten home yet… After how hard she’d been working, coming home every day exhausted and falling into bed right after she’d cooked them some dinner, he was trying to make things easier on her by having dinner ready for her. And this time, he wouldn’t almost burn the kitchen down.

“Human eyes,” he muttered to himself as he felt along the wall, guiding himself into the kitchen. Before the metacrisis, he could have strode through this apartment without so much as a glint of light from outside. Now, trying something like that would likely end with split shins on the coffee table.  
Just another step to the fuse box… He reached out his hand for the steel box set into the wall. But just as he touched cold metal, his wrist was seized and he was jerked away from the wall. Crying out, he tried to pull away from his attacker but was already knocked off balance and instead collapsed to the ground, flailing for more of a hold on the person in the dark.

He hit the ground, lying still as he tried to regain his breath after the impact. Spluttering a couple times, he tried to get the hair out of his face. Hair? He reached up to brush it away, only to find his other wrist seized and forced over his head. Lips brushed against his ear, sending an involuntary shudder down his back. “The darkness is more… becoming,” a silky voice said, made huskier by the bad attempt at a Transylvania accent.

“Rose?” he repeated, struggling to adjust to the darkness to see the form he was sure loomed above him.

Teeth scraped down the column of his throat, forcing him to end his question with a slight moan.

“I have been so very… weary of late. Perhaps I need a bit of a snack to sustain myself.”

He felt her teeth plying into the soft skin of his neck. More importantly, he felt other parts of him responding to her dark game. So she’d missed him just as much as he’d missed her lately…

“Oh no, you mustn’t drain me dry, queen of the night.” He did his best to play along, taking on every bit of the breathless victim persona.

It only made her hide her face in his shoulder to suppress a giggle.

“But I cannot pass up such a tasty treat. It’s not often such rare blood comes into this world.” She pressed down further against him, making him breathless for real as he felt every soft curve pressed against all of his hard lines.

Trying his best to cover despite the bulge in his trousers, he turned his head to give her better access to his neck. “But if you feast off me, does that mean I’ll become one of your kind? A half-Time Lord, half-human, half-vampire? No, that’s too many halves. A third? That doesn’t have the same ring. Oh!”

He took in a sharp breath as her teeth sunk into his skin, her tongue darting out to sooth it almost immediately. “You only become a child of the night if you drink my blood as well,” she murmured into his neck, her hands tightening around his.

He grinned down at her, even though she would never see him in the dark. “Will I be so lucky to taste that?”

Her teeth plied against his skin again, soft scattered nibbles that had him shuddering beneath her. “If you’re a good little treat, you just might.”


	17. graveyard

“Don’t you think that’s the tiniest bit disrespectful, Doctor?”

He turned to look at her mid leap, and the toe of his trainer caught on the top of the tombstone, sending him toppling across the grass. He tumbled right into the next row of graves, crashing against a stone with an “OOMPH!”

She leaned back against the mausoleum behind her with a shake of her head.

He jumped back to his feet, dusting himself off. “I keep forgetting you humans have such funny ideas about what to do with the old bodies.”

She stood straight abruptly, glaring at him through the dim light of the graveyard. "You’re human too, you know! And they’re not funny. It’s only right to respect those that went before us.“  
She could see one of his eyebrows cock. "By representing their thoughts and beliefs, and honoring the innovations their lives brought forth. Not by worshipping an oddly shaped rock stuck into the ground over their dead bodies. Do you know how much space in the world is taken up by human sentimentality like graveyards?”

She gaped at him. She’d known, in his last regeneration, he’d had a difference of opinion with her and thought letting the Gelth take over corpses was just like recycling, but she had been sure the negative turn of events had changed his mind.

“You cannot mean that!”

“But I do. Perfectly viable land, that when first dedicated to the storage of deceased humans would have been perfect for farming or building or some other innovation, and humans pile bones in it and visit to make them sad.”

“My gran is in this graveyard!” She knew she was shouting at him, but she couldn’t make herself stop.

“…Rose? I thought you understood my position on all of this, the cultural differences between your people and mine. I thought we’d only come here to trace an anomaly one that graveyards like this incubate all the time. I don’t understand why you’re so upset. I–”

“EXACTLY! You don’t understand! And you don’t care enough to try!” She huffed in frustration, doing her best to bring her volume back under control. “I will not stand here and be told that my beliefs are just me being silly.”

She turned away from him, mission be damned. She could call in another team to handle it. Or better yet, the Doctor could stay here to solve this case on his own.


	18. fog machine

“Doctor?!” she stumbled through the room, coughing and pressing her scarf closer to her nose. The fog was so thick that she couldn’t even see her hand in front of her face. She was used to fog banks rolling of the Thames, but indoors? In her flat?

“Rose!” she heard him call out and sputter off into coughing to her right. She turned, guiding herself into the living room along the wall.  
“Doctor!” Her hand groped blindly for his.

“Rose!” He helped to steady her before he pushed her back towards the wall. “Rose, I can’t shut it off!”

Coughing, she felt along the wall blindly until her leg brushed against something. Bending down, her hand closed around a cord and she pulled, unplugging the machine. She heard it’s fans whir to a stop, and with relief she pushed the Doctor back out the door and to the hall.

Collapsing to the floor next to him, waving a hand in front of her face to clear some of the swirling mist around.

After a long pause, when both their breaths had leveled out, she turned to look at him.

“Did you really try to soup up a fog machine?” He shrugged, avoiding her eyes. “Why?”

He peeked at her under his fringe of hair. “We were going to… have our own haunted house.”

She stared at him for a while before throwing her head back and laughing. “Is that what this was all about? Because I’m pretty sure we already found all the dark corners in the flat.” She nudged him with her shoulder, her tongue poking out between her teeth.

Before he could say anything back, alarms started sounding throughout the building. Neighbors down the hall started to emerge and head for the stairs, shooting glares at them in passing.

She got to her feet, holding her hand out to him. “Come on. We’d better get outside so that you can explain to the fire chief what happened this time.”

He took her fingers between his, pulling himself to his feet with a groan.


	19. Ouija board

“Come on, then,” Rose said to him, nodding to the empty space across the table from her. He peered at her curiously before settling in.

“You actually found one?”

Rose shrugged, adjusting the board and fiddling with the oddly-shaped disc. “They’re not hard to find. Practically in every game shop. We used to play with them all the time in grade school. Though mum wasn’t happy with me buying it, not after…” After the ghost incident before Canary Wharf, she finished silently.

He lowered his eyes to the board. “How does it work?”

“Right!” She stopped fiddling with the planchette, setting it down in the middle of the board and putting her hands on it. “You put your hands on it too, like so. Supposedly any spirits that want to communicate with us will push it around the board to answer our questions.”

He arched his eyebrow at her, keeping his hands in his lap. “Hey, you’re the one that was curious about it, remember?”

He sighed and placed his hands on the other side of the pointer from her. “Anyone in particular you want to talk to?” she teased, tongue poking out. He shook his head, angling it to look curiously around the board. “Alright, we’ll leave it open.

"Hello? Anyone out in the spirit world wants to talk to us?”

Nothing happened. He raised his eyes back to her and arched an eyebrow again in silent question. She opened her mouth to explain, but clicked it shut as the planchette started sliding across the board.

“Doctor? Are you moving it?” she gasped, watching as the tool moved slowly to the Hello.

“C'mon, Rose, moving it around like that isn’t going to help me understand this silly little human game,” he warned.

“It’s not me, Doctor!”

They blinked at each other. “Is there someone listening to our questions?” the Doctor asked, his eyes not leaving Rose’s.

The planchette slid across to the Yes.

“Do you have any warnings for us?” Rose asked softly.

The planchette slid away and back to the Yes.

“You swear this isn’t the Doctor moving it around?” she asked, looking back up at the Doctor.

It hesitated for a moment before swiveling back around to yes.

“Or Rose moving it?” the Doctor countered.

Once again yes.

She’d never felt it pull this hard on her. Maybe the gap to the spirit world was thinner in this universe, or after the collapse of the walls of reality. Either way, Rose was excited to see this work, and hunched closer to the board.

“What’s your warning for us?” The planchette hesitated before sliding down towards the letters. Her eyes followed each one, craning around to see what letters it was landing on.

“Mrs. Hatchley…. is an alien,” she read out slowly.

“I knew it!” the Doctor crowed, nearly removing his hands from the board. “Crotchety old woman like that, getting after me for every little thing, it was just three little smoke alarms going off I don’t see what the big deal is–”

“Is anything going to be happening tonight?” Rose asked, cutting him off.

The planchette slid up to yes.

She sighed, glancing surreptitiously towards her phone. “Does it involve Torchwood?”

It slid across to no.

She perked up, brow furrowing. “Then what is it?”

It slid down to F.

“Fire?” Rose guessed.

U.

“Full invasion? Futuristic discovery? Fumigation–”

C.

Her hands dropped away from the board and glared at the man across from her. “Doctor.”

“But Roooooose. Nothing was happening, and it was getting boring, and–wait, Rose! Come back! It was only a game, no need to get grumpy. Roooooose!”


	20. costume

“Alright, Rose, what do you think!” He slid into the room, and her heart stuttered before picking up its pace. He wore a wide-brimmed hat, shirt open wide at the neck line, dusty pants, whip looped at his hip. Well, she’d always had a crush on a certain archeology professor.

Her eyes slid back up to his face, and a grin spread across her lips at the equally dumb-founded look he wore. Her hands smoothed down the pinstripe skirt she wore.

“And where,” he asked, stepping closer to her and tugging the swirly tie out of her jacket and winding it around his hands, “did you muster this up?”

She grinned wider, hands sliding up his chest. “Would you believe Patrice had some fabric left over after custom making your suit? Not much, though. Unfortunately, she had to go a little short on the skirt.”

He hummed in agreement, sliding his own hands down to her arse and barely stroking the skin just below the hem of the skirt. “Right shame, that.”

Leaning up in her trainers, she pressed her lips the the shell of his ear. “Ready to leave for mum’s early Halloween bash, then?”

Rubbing his hands up and down her rear like he was thinking, he managed to push her closer to him. “I don’t know. You see, I’ve got this whip here and just oh so many ideas now from that costume, Doctor…” She shivered against him.


	21. spandex

“What do you think of this?”

Rose looked up from the magazine she had been reading and promptly spit out her tea. “What are you wearing?” she screeched, gasping for breath.

He looked down at the blue and red outfit, pulling at it self-consciously. “I’m dressed as… Captain Britain… The girl at the shop down the way assured me that it would be a hit.”

He watched as her eyes slid down his form, pausing in certain areas before sliding back up. His self-consciousness melted away into a sideways grin. “I’m sure she did,” Rose finally said. “Spandex doesn’t hide much. Then again, you’ve always aimed at being so transparent, haven’t you, Doctor?” she teased, tongue poking out. “But I thought you were going to go as Indiana Jones.”

He looked down at himself again and held his hands out. “You wouldn’t let me out in that outfit. I needed something to go to parties in.”

She got up from the couch, stalking over to him. “And you think you’ll get out of the flat in that outfit?” Her hand slid down the smooth muscles of his chest and abs, making him suck in a breath.


End file.
